Collateral Damage
by jancat10
Summary: We all have a past, but a man of fabled name and wealth has a past that always follows him. And if he's dating Elizabeth Bennet, he should expect some difficult conversations.


_We all have a past, but a man of fabled name and wealth has a past that always follows him._

**Collateral Damage**

The car ride home had been deathly quiet. Elizabeth didn't speak, didn't look at William. She just got out of the car, walked into the house and up the stairs. He took a breath and followed. The silence ended as he crossed the threshold.

"How can you stand this? London has seven million people living in it, but your world is this little bubble full of the `lads from Eton,' the `chaps from Oxford,' and the women you all dated. And a whole bunch of other stuffy people." Elizabeth's eyes were blazing and she missed the injured look on his face.

"You know what would help before I take your arm and wander through another of these society gigs? If you would at least tell me…, at least clue me in about which women there have slept with you."

There, she'd said it. No more thinking about it and worrying over it. Tonight's exchange in the powder room was the final straw. Ladies Tweedledee and Tweedledum stopped her, exclaimed over her jewelry, and made it clear she was one lucky woman to have captured the heart and warmed the bed of Fitzwilliam Darcy. And an American! Elizabeth's quick wit and sharp tongue froze until she squeaked out a retort about the joy of a gentleman who knew how to take out his silver spoon and mingle with the hoi polloi from across the pond.

Elizabeth took a breath and pulled off her earrings. Softly, she said, "I know you didn't sleep around that much before we met, Will. I know that. But they're all here, aren't they? I only slept with three men before meeting you, and you've met one of them." Elizabeth raised her head and finally looked at William, standing still by the door. "I'm tired of being blindsided."

William stared at her. "Blindsided?" He pulled off his tie and twisted it in his hands. "I don't know who these women are who profess to know me, to have slept with me."

Sighing, he sat down next to her on the bed and took her hand. "I've been with eight women, Elizabeth. Eight. Quite impressive for a 28-year-old, hmm?" He rolled his eyes. "I was a virgin till I was 19. My friends laughed at me. Too scared to sully the Darcy name or make a mistake and sire an heir, and it was safe, it is safer just to be alone unless the woman means something to me. Or I'm drunk enough and lonely enough to screw up."

"You know this about me," he said softly. "We've been together for five months. What happened tonight?" He looked up and met her eyes in the mirror. "Look, if you want to talk about this, let's do it."

Elizabeth nodded, and stood up. She walked across the room, dropped her earring on the vanity and kicked off her shoes. "Yes. But not in here. I don't want to hear another woman's name in our bedroom." She looked up at him and saw his eyes widen. "And you don't want to hear another man's name."

Within a few minutes, they were in the living room, clad in pajamas and facing each other on the couch. Will reached out his hand and traced her fingers. "Me first?"

Elizabeth shook her head. "No, my list is shorter. Pat Stafford, sophomore year. Mark Lee, grad school. And then Ethan off and on for two years till I met you."

Will listened, head lowered. He wanted to know everything and nothing about Ethan, but she rarely mentioned him so he never pressed for details. He'd rather know less and let it fester. It was the past. He raised his eyes and met hers. "So, there wasn't anyone else? No one in between, before we reconnected?"

She shook her head. He'd needed this reassurance before. "No, I told you, Will. Just some guy I ate lunch with a few times, had drinks with, but nothing romantic or anything like that."

"You never mentioned seeing anyone here," he said, stricken.

"Will." She put her hand on his cheek. "I didn't date him. He was a friend. I was happy to have someone to talk to, and he seemed pleased to hang out with the new American chick. I kept my distance." She looked at him closely. "He knew you."

He cocked an eyebrow at her and tilted his head. Oh yeah, she thought, everyone here knows him.

"No, he really did know you. He went to school with you at Eton. Andrew Witton-Smith?"

Darcy stared at her, trying not to stutter out his next words too angrily. "Did he know you knew me before you started having lunch?"

"I don't know. But he knew it by the second lunch. He made little jokes, and I could tell that there was some old rivalry there."

"Yeah. You could call it that," he spat out.

"Will, he talked a bit about you as a boy, about how smart you were. And," she faltered. "we weren't talking, and it was so nice to hear about you, to remind me that you were a real person, not just a regret. I'm sorry. Maybe I shouldn't have…."

"No, Lizzy. It's fine, I just….I don't trust him. We weren't friends. He was a wanker and I hate the thought of him near you."

Elizabeth raised his hands to her lips and kissed his fingers. "We had lunch three times, and coffee once. That's all. And he was across the table. He never touched me, Will. I wouldn't have let him. He did ask how I felt about casual sex, but I laughed at him and said I was still in isolation for rabies. That shut it down."

Will's eyes went ice cold at her words. He pulled away and looked at the floor. "When I came back to school after my mother died, everybody kept their distance from me. The teachers were very nice, but no 12-year-old boy knows what to say to another 12-year-old boy. Richard was there, then, but no one else knew how to talk to me. So it was ignored, like it never happened. Except when we had mixers with the girls' school. They knew and they all wanted to dance with me or hug me or let me know I could talk to them. I was scared shitless of them, but Andrew and his friends wanted the attention. They used her death. `They were afraid of losing their mums, too, they needed hugs…'"

Her eyes were misty and her anger spent. "Oh Will."

"At Oxford, it was the same thing, only he turned it back on me, said I had mummy issues and only looked at green-eyed blondes because they resembled my mother."

Oh god.

"One day, playing rugby, he tossed off a comment about my `blonde cheering squad.' I clocked him. I'd never hit anyone before. He never said another word as far as I know."

Wiping away the tear running down her cheek, Elizabeth reached over and lifted his chin. "Hey, I'm pretty good with a left hook. If we ever seen him again, I get dibs."

Will raised his eyes to hers and smiled. "Dibs? You're such an American girl." He leaned forward and kissed her. "My American girl."

"And your English girls? And the French one?"

He groaned. "Elizabeth. I was dull, a monk. No relationships lasted longer than a few months. You know that." He shook his head and whispered, "None of them were there tonight. It's unlikely any of them would ever meet you. That's their loss."

The list he'd given her six months earlier, back when they met again in New York, flowed through her head. Julia Treamor, Portia Llewellyn-Jones, Katherine Percy, Martine Abrioux, Rebecca Churchill, Cate Armstrong, Tatiana something….

He pulled her close and kissed her cheek, her temple, her nose. "No one touched my heart. No one knew me. I was waiting for you. Always you."


End file.
